British Library puts 19th century newspapers online

The British Library has announced that it's placed 2 million digitised and searchable newspapers pages online that date from as far back as 1800.

The service, which isn't free but is available on a pay-as-you-go basis, will let you crawl through the pages of history for any search terms you choose. Sadly, there was no mention of "pocket-lint" in the 19th century.

The scanning isn't perfect, confusing "Geere" with "George", but if there's one thing the archive shows us, it's that newspapers haven't changed all that much. Tabloid panics (about highwaymen) and gossip about the love lives of minor royals are all present and correct.

It's free to search the archive, but to view the full-text articles it'll cost £7 for 24 hours (allowing 100 downloads) or £10 for 7 days (and 200 downloads). A couple of papers are free - the Graphic and the Penny Illustrated Paper.